Guidance Document Database

A reduction in benefits is not considered a plan termination but is a reportable event.

PBGC recognizes pension credits for discharged employees found to have been illegal discharged and reinstated for the period after the illegal discharge and ending with the date of plan termination.

Section 4044 asset allocation rules take precedence over any contrary plan provisions.

A tax qualified defined benefit plan is covered.

Because plan does not provide for reversion of excess assets to sponsor, residual assets must be distributed to plan participants and their beneficiaries, pro rata, in relation to their accrued benefits.

Addresses the individual account plan coverage exemption.

State licensed planner whose company provides consulting services to assist municipal planning boards with development plans, land use studies and housing surveys is a Professional Service Employer and plan is exempt from Title IV coverage.

Where proposed language in CBA will not affect Title IV coverage, it will not prevent PBGC claim for employer liability.

Regards a statutory provision under which a contributing employer to a multiemployer plan that sells its assets to an unrelated buyer does not withdraw from the plan if (among other things) the buyer posts a bond or escrow and the sales contract makes the seller secondarily liable if the buyer withdraws during the 5 plan years after the sale. Addresses calculation of withdrawal liability of an employer that previously sold some of its assets where, under that statutory provision, the asset sale was not a withdrawal.

A plan maintained by a union and funded only by contributions from union members is not covered under Title IV

Whether PBGC will permit a plan to be restored after it has submitted its Notice of its Intent to Terminate.

Addresses the exclusion of employee contributions in withdrawal liability allocation fractions.

Management consultant is not a professional individual for purposes of the Professional Service Employer plan coverage exemption.

A plan was not a successor plan to another plan, because both plans existed during the same plan year.

A death benefit is not a pension benefit and as such is treated as a liability before plan termination and must be deducted from the plan’s available assets.

Disability benefits that become payable after the date of plan termination are not guaranteed.

Disability benefits guaranteed where participants satisfied plan conditions necessary to receive the benefit before the date of plan termination.

Employer’s principal business is the installation of cathodic protection systems, employer is not a Professional Service Employer and plan is covered under Title IV.

Provides that PBGC approval is not required for a multiemployer plan to adopt a different statutory allocation method for unfunded vested benefits. However, PBGC approval is required for the adoption of an alternative allocation method (i.e. any method other than the four statutory methods).

A plan sponsored by a political subdivision that has taxing power is excluded from coverage.

Any amendment to a terminating or terminated plan to allow a return of excess plan assets to the employer conflicts with direct statutory provisions and legislative intent.

Addresses post-termination distribution of a multiemployer plan's assets when participants are missing.

A plan did not properly terminate and does not fit the exemption from Title IV coverage for plans that do not provide for employer contributions.

Plans maintained by instrumentalities of the Federal government are exempt from coverage under the Governmental plan coverage exemption.

Addresses the definition of the term “assets” for the purpose of the sale-of-assets exception to withdrawal.